BLM To Analyze East Grasshopper, Medicine Lodge Watersheds

The Bureau of Land Management’s Dillon Field Office will analyze the existing resource conditions on BLM-administered public lands within the East Grasshopper and Medicine Lodge Watersheds this summer.

The East Grasshopper Watershed includes 16 grazing allotments and 79,000 acres of BLM-administered public land. The Medicine Lodge Watershed includes 16 grazing allotments and 39,000 acres of BLM-administered public land. The five standards for rangeland health will be reviewed on an allotment-by-allotment basis to determine whether or not the standards are being met.

Standards include: maintaining properly functioning upland and riparian areas, assuring that water quality and air quality meet state standards, and providing for biodiversity. Forest health, fuels conditions and conifer encroachment issues are also included within the land health standards. Where standards for land health are not met, contributing factors will be identified and recommendations for corrective action will be developed and presented by the interdisciplinary team.

National Environment Policy Act documents will be prepared next winter to analyze alternatives for revised management where resource concerns are found within these watersheds.

The assessments, determinations and any necessary NEPA documents will be completed by resource specialists from the Dillon Field Office in coordination with permittees/lessees, other agencies and the interested public.

If you would like to know more about this process or have information or data that may be helpful to BLM, please call (406) 683-8000 or email MT_Dillon_FO@blm.gov.

The BLM manages more than 245 million acres of public land, the most of any Federal agency. This land, known as the National System of Public Lands, is primarily located in 12 Western states, including Alaska. The BLM also administers 700 million acres of sub-surface mineral estate throughout the nation. The BLM's mission is to manage and conserve the public lands for the use and enjoyment of present and future generations under our mandate of multiple-use and sustained yield. In Fiscal Year 2013, the BLM generated $4.7 billion in receipts from public lands.